PR-22-2023
August 29, 2023, MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA – The Philippine Consulate General in Melbourne hosted the seminal Philippines-Australia Creative Arts Roundtable on August 29, 2023. The initiative brought together distinguished figures from the arts, academia, and the Filipino artistic community in Victoria to discuss and revisit past projects as well as explore future collaborations to enhance Filipino-Australian arts and cultural exchanges.
The roundtable provided an overview of key initiatives that have helped shape Philippine-Australian artistic and academic interactions over the last two decades, particularly through the partnerships of La Trobe University and the Ateneo de Manila University. Covering a wide spectrum—from annual art residencies and mutual exhibitions to film festivals and regional arts endeavors—the discussions shed light on the indispensable contributions of various cultural institutions and community figures. They also recognized the importance of sustaining these collaborative efforts and other future projects aimed at encouraging cross-cultural dialogues, including indigenous art collaborations, regional exposures and engagement of the wider community.
Through the Philippines-Australia Forum (PAF)@La Trobe, a project that benefited from the Congressional initiative of Sen. Loren Legarda, there is an expressed interest in branching out from purely academic pursuits to include cultural and artistic collaborations with the community.
The roundtable culminated in outlining several promising future projects, ranging from broadening the scope of artist residency programs and extending opportunities for multi-media arts exhibitions, to fostering intergenerational dialogues among artists. As a result of the discussions, plans are being developed underlining the ongoing commitment to engage pivotal stakeholders for these initiatives to come to fruition.
The Philippine Consulate General in Melbourne shares the collective aspiration to further enrich the connections between Filipino and Australian communities in both academic and artistic spheres, with the view to further elevating the Philippines-Australia bilateral relationship. END
